U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday announced that Washington had reached a “Full and Complete” trade deal with Seoul, setting blanket tariffs on the country’s exports to U.S. at 15%.
This deal means that duties will be lowered from the 25% that Trump had threatened in his “tariff letter” to Seoul earlier this month. Tariffs on the country’s auto exports set at 25% will also be cut to 15%.
Trump also said in his post on social media platform Truth Social that South Korea “will give to the United States $350 Billion Dollars for Investments owned and controlled by the United States, and selected by myself, as President.”
South Korea’s President Lee Jae-myung said in a Facebook post that his country had concluded tariff negotiations with the United States and the $350 billion fund “will play a role in facilitating the active entry of Korean companies into the US market in industries where we have strengths, such as shipbuilding, semiconductors, secondary batteries, biotechnology, and energy,” according to a CNBC translation of his statement in Korean.
He said $150 billion of that allocation will be for “shipbuilding cooperation providing strong support for Korean companies entering the US shipbuilding industry,” adding that “It’s important to achieve mutually beneficial outcomes, not just pursue unilateral gains.”
